


Any Less Dead

by scxlias (orphan_account)



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Spoilers: the death is Gansey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-02
Updated: 2016-01-02
Packaged: 2018-05-11 02:52:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5611132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/scxlias
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gansey dies on a Tuesday and its nothing special.</p><p>There’s no ceremony, no dramatic scene, no… nothing.</p><p>Or the remains of the gang directly after Gansey's death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Any Less Dead

Gansey dies on a Tuesday and its nothing special.

There’s no ceremony, no dramatic scene, no… nothing.

Blue thinks about how she’d once thought that boys like Gansey didn’t die, that they were molded out of bronze and installed as statues, and she thinks about how fucking wrong she was.

Because Blue is crying and Ronan is yelling and Noah is flickering in and out of existence and Adam is staring in shock…

And Gansey is very much dead.

She doesn’t know how long she’s been sitting there, her hands shaking, tears trailing down her face, breath hitching in her throat when suddenly there are arms wrapping around her waist.

She screams, swinging her fists towards whoever is grabbing her, squirming in an effort to get away.

“Stop it! Blue, stop!” Ronan says, voice loud, right next to her ear, “We have to… The cops are coming, Blue, come on, you have to let him go.” And that’s when she realizes her hands had been gripping Gansey’s ridiculous teal polo.

“I can’t… I… Ronan, let me go! Let me go, Lynch! Goddammit, let me go!”

Ronan doesn’t let her go.

He holds onto her as she lets out a wail loud as a banshee and collapses. With one strong arm, he drags her back and holds her up as her knees give out. Noah flashes back into existence. Adam flinches.

Ronan says nothing as Blue clenches her fists and starts beating on his chest, just holds her close and lets her hit him. The arm that’s not holding Blue reaches out towards Adam, Ronan’s hand resting heavily on his shoulder.

Ronan starts mentally cataloging the alcohol he has stashed at Monmouth, wondering if it’ll be enough to numb this pain. He’ll offer some to Blue, he thinks. At least it’ll help someone. He knows Adam won’t accept.

A cop car pulls up behind them, Noah flickers out of existence.

Blue lets her fists come to rest on Ronan’s chest, sniffles, takes a huge, shaky breath and gets her feet firmly underneath her.

She doesn’t let Ronan remove his arm from around her shoulders the entire time they talk to the cops.

None of them pay much attention to what happens after there. They answer questions numbly. The cop remembers Adam and Ronan from the night he arrested Adam’s dad. Adam and Ronan don’t care.

Someone comes and takes Gansey’s body and Blue buries her face in Ronan’s chest. Adam’s breath hitches and Ronan’s hand darts out towards him, gripping his forearm tightly. Noah flickers near the cop’s shoulder.

The doors of the coroners van slam shut and Adam flinches again. Ronan’s grip tightens on Blue and Adam.

When the cop finally lets them go, Ronan’s hand goes to his pocket, to the dream key for the Pig. He wants to take the key and hurl into the woods so he never has to look at it again. He takes it and jams it into the ignition instead. Blue climbs into the passenger seat and Adam gets in the back, Noah’s form appearing next to him. Ronan breaks every traffic law he can on the way home.

Blue calls 300 Fox Way and talks to Calla and tells her what happened and says she’s not coming home.

The second she’s off the phone, Ronan’s holding out a bottle of vodka. She accepts without a word.

To Blue and Ronan’s surprise, Adam does too.

They pass the bottle around until its empty and they’re buzzed and pleasantly numb. Noah guides Ronan to his room, brings Blue to his own room and leaves Adam where he’s passed out on the couch, makes sure he’s okay, then flickers out of existence.

He reappears when Blue screams herself awake, and again when Ronan awakes in a cold sweat with the tire iron that had killed his father in his hand, and again when Adam starts thrashing in his sleep, begging his father to stop.

When she awakes and starts numbly moving around the apartment after downing a handful of painkillers, Blue thinks.

She thinks so much that as Ronan shuffles into the kitchen/bathroom, helping her make coffee and set out breakfast, she has tears in her eyes.

She’s full on sobbing by the time Adam stirs and wakes.

Because she’d thought boys like Gansey didn’t die.

Because even though boys like him were bronzed and installed outside public libraries, that didn’t make them any less dead.

**Author's Note:**

> Check me out on tumblr at grxywarens!


End file.
